‘Thor: Love and Thunder’: Chris Hemsworth Only Wanted to Play Thor Again if 1 Person Was Involved

At one point, Chris Hemsworth was about ready to hang up his hammer as Thor. He wasn’t proud of the work he had done on Thor: The Dark World in 2013 and ultimately found himself getting bored of the character. However, that all changed with 2017’s Thor: Ragnarok and its director, Taika Waititi. Hemsworth loved working with Waititi so much that he almost didn’t agree to join Thor: Love and Thunder without him. Here’s why.

Chris Hemsworth has spent over a decade playing Thor

Chris Hemsworth made his Marvel debut as the God of Thunder in 2011’s Thor. One year later, he joined fellow Marvel heroes in The Avengers. From there, Hemsworth reprised his role in several sequels and other Marvel films, including Avengers: Age of Ultron, Avengers: Endgame, and Doctor Strange.

Thor: Love and Thunder, the fourth Thor film, Hemsworth’sorth’s ninth time playing the character. In the new movie, Thor sets out on a quest for inner peace, but he has one final mission first: stop Gorr the Butcher’s (Christian Bale) plan to destroy all of the gods. He’ll need help from Valkyrie (Tessa Thompson), Korg (Taika Waititi), and the Mighty Thor, Jane Foster (Natalie Portman).

Chris Hemsworth only joined ‘Thor: Love and Thunder’ because of its director, Taika Waititi

After Thor: The Dark World, Chris Hemsworth wasn’t sure he wanted to play Thor again. Then, he sat down with Waititi, and they revitalized the film series with Thor: Ragnarok. In a June 2022 interview with Vanity Fair, Hemsworth recalled telling Waititi that he was “bored” with Thor.

“And he said, ‘Yeah, I’m really bored of Thor, too.’ And then we decided not to be bored and any time that feeling came into play, we’d go in a different direction,” the Spiderhead star said. “We just dismantled the character to have him be a little more unpredictable. We wanted him to be in a different set of circumstances than he’d been in before. And also have the humor come through.”

Now, Hemsworth can’t imagine working with anyone else on a Thor movie. When Waititi signed on for Thor: Love and Thunder, Hemsworth knew he could join the film.

“I don’t know that I would’ve done another if Taika hadn’t said yes, he was going to do it,” he said. “And he had written this beautiful script which was a wacky, crazy, romantic comedy set in space and that I hadn’t seen before.”

Is Hemsworth’s retirement from Marvel coming soon?

Of course, Chris Hemsworth can’t play Thor forever. There may come another time when his role begins to feel stale. However, in an interview with Total Film, he said he would stick with the MCU as long as there are original ideas for Thor.

“I love playing the character, I really do,” Hemsworth said. “It always comes down to: ‘Is this script different to the last one? Are we repeating something?’ And when it becomes too familiar, I think that’s when I’d have to say, ‘Yeah, no, this doesn’t … I think I’ve … [Laughs] I’d like to exit before people tell me to exit.”

Thor: Love and Thunder premieres in theaters on July 8.